Southern Charms

by Trana Mae Simmons

  The lion’s roar ended in a creaking yawn, and it closed its mouth, eyeing Shane as though his move followed next in this crazy, unpredictable dance.

  “Ellie,” Shane whispered.

  “Yes?” she whispered in return. Her fingers clenched in his shirt back, tiny and reminding him how extremely small she was. She would nearly fit inside that lion’s mouth with room to spare.

  “I’m going to move backward, step by step,” Shane told her. “Move with me, but keep yourself completely hidden behind me.”

  “Don’t worry,” she breathed more than actually spoke. “I’m not about to show myself to that beast unless it’s to run.”

  “For God’s sake, don’t do that! Just don’t get under my feet and make me stumble, or you’ll be wide open to him. I’m going to count to three over and over. We’ll take a small step on each three.”

  “I understand.”

  “One. Two. Three.” Shane cautiously moved one foot backward, and Ellie glided with him. They would have done well together in a ball room.

  The lion roared and moved a step closer.

  “What did he do?” Ellie cried in a frantic croak.

  “He—never mind. I won’t let him past me. Let’s go again. One. Two. Three.”

  He stepped back with the other foot, and Ellie went with him. The lion roared and moved a step closer.

  “Goddamn it to hell,” Shane said without thinking.

  “What?” Ellie demanded. “What’s he doing?”

  Shane could tell by her movements that she was trying to see around him—to see whether the lion was preparing to spring. He wished like hell he knew that himself.

  He shoved his arms stiffly behind him to hold Ellie in place. “One. Two.”

  “Darn it—” she said.

  “Three.”

  Lucky for them both, she moved with him, but with a sigh of impatience this time. Darn the woman anyway. Not only was she fey, she was evidently one of those women who didn’t take kindly to letting a man handle things. She pushed at his arm, which barred her from peering around his wideness, but he stiffened it further.

  “Quit trying to move around me, damn it,” he snarled in a low voice. “That lion looks hungry.”

  She gasped and stopped fighting his hold.

  “Hey!” someone to the left of them yelled. “Hey, don’t move like that. It could be dangerous!”

  “No shit,” Shane muttered, though not loud enough for whoever spoke to hear him. Not loud enough to disturb the hungry beast in front of him. “But you think I’m going to stand here and be eaten?”

  He took a breath, whispered a quick “One-two-three” and moved with Ellie. The lion advanced into his retreat, too, but only that one step.

  “Hey!” the voice yelled again. “Stop moving. He thinks you’re doing his trick with him!”

  Shane risked a glance to the left. The sparkled-and-spangled woman walked toward him, the huge elephant trailing in her wake, its trunk dancing from side to side and its feet stirring up puffs of dust. Good god, if the lion didn’t eat them, the elephant would probably trample them! Ellie wasn’t big enough to leave even a faint grease spot in the dirt beneath that animal’s huge foot.

  He recalled an elephant-foot footstool in his mother’s parlor and vowed to accidently throw the damned thing into the fireplace when he got home.

  “What trick?” he cautiously asked the woman.

  “Just don’t move again,” she said instead of answering. Then she stepped aside and tapped the elephant on the trunk with the long, hooked pole she carried. “Now, Tiny.”

  Tiny? The elephant was named Tiny? The thought barely registered in Shane’s mind before all three of them—Shane, Ellie and the lion—were showered with an engulfing spray of water. The elephant. The damned elephant had sprayed them all with the contents of its trunk!

  Shane took a step back and came up against a coughing, choking Ellie. His boot heel encountered her tiny foot, and somehow he managed to stop himself before he crushed it with his weight. The jerky change of movement threw him off balance, and he started to fall, horrified when he realized his falling body would leave Ellie open to the lion’s charge.

  With one swipe, he caught Ellie to him as he went down. With a swift twist, he changed his direction of fall to land on his back, with Ellie cradled in his arms. The lion could still get her, and its roar sounded as though it were right in his ear. He flung Ellie to his side and scrambled into a protective crouch over top of her.

  The lion roared again. The elephant, trunk empty now, joined in the clamor with its own trumpeting bellow. Shane groaned and cuddled Ellie against his chest, waiting for the lion’s fangs to pierce his back.

  Something tapped him on the shoulder.

  “You can get up now. I’m going to take Sinbad back to his cage. All he needed was for the water to shower him and let him know the trick was done.”

  Shane stayed frozen. Get up? He’d be damned if he would. Be eaten if he did.

  Something tapped him again, this time on his upper arm. He glanced aside and saw the tip of the hooked stick the woman had carried. Hell, if the lion wasn’t going to eat her, maybe he and Ellie were safe.

  “I said, it’s all right for you to get up now,” she said. “I tried to tell you that Sinbad thought you were doing his trick with him—backing away like you were afraid of him. They do the same thing in the ring.”

  Very cautiously, Shane loosened his hold on Ellie and looked down into her face. Her little bonnet was missing and her white-blond hair scattered all around her head. Her blue eyes gazed back at him, still filled with fear, and her terror jolted him—angered him. He got to his feet, pulling Ellie with him and shoving her behind him once again.

  Furious, he glared at the woman and elephant. “What the hell do you mean, he thought he was doing a trick?”

  “Just what I said,” she replied with a shrug of a spangled shoulder. “Conroy, the animal trainer, does a trick like that in the ring. He pretends Sinbad is stalking him. Then Tiny squirts the two of them with water from his trunk, and Sinbad hightails it back to his cage.” She flicked her head to the side. “See? Sinbad’s over there by his cage now. I need to go let him in before he decides he’s supposed to do the trick again.”

  She turned and started away, and Shane took a step after her. “Just wait a damned minute—”

  The elephant trumpeted, sat down and lifted its front feet into the air. Shane froze, starting up, up at the potential footstools wavering over him. Damn, that elephant actually had teeth, too. Tusks, he thought they called them.

  The woman turned back. “Oh, Tiny, quit it,” she said. “You’re scaring these people as bad as Sinbad did. Come on.”

  She tapped Tiny’s front leg with her stick, and the elephant fell back to earth. Shane sneezed in the shower of dust Tiny’s feet whipped up on the edge of the mud puddle where he and Ellie stood. By the time he cleared his nose and eyes, the woman and elephant were nearly to the lion’s cage. Sighing in defeat and embarrassment, Shane turned to look at Ellie.

  She stood there bedraggled and dirty, her hair trailing nearly to the ground. He’d never seen a woman with such long hair, even one undressed in her bedroom. But what caught his gaze even more was the front of her dress. The elephant’s shower had soaked her as well, and the thin material outlined a pair of very adequate breasts for her tiny stature. The nipples on them perked toward him in a beckoning manner.

  He jerked his gaze free, but it didn’t stop that randy part of him from stiffening in much the same manner as her nipples. She didn’t seem to notice, thank goodness. Tears filled her blue eyes, and she sniffed, circling her arms around herself.

  “This has been one horrible evening,” she murmured. “I just want to go ho—home!” Then the tears broke.

  Shane pulled her into his arms. Surprisingly, she fit perfectly into the space he initially thought too large for her. A strong urge to care for her—do anything within his power to stop her tears—filled him.


  At the same moment he realized it was going to take an awful lot of power on his part to keep his mind on business and the reason he came to...Texas. He made the trip to verify this woman’s identity, not fall for her.

  Hell, if the Pinkertons were right, Ellie didn’t even know for sure who she was herself. Given his already intense but confusing feelings for her, what on earth would happen when he tried to get close enough to her to confirm or deny her identity?

  But he did have to try to get close to her, he reminded himself. Just not in that way. Besides, if he slipped and allowed something more than a strict friendship between them, she would hate him when she found out why he really came to...Texas.

  Chapter 4

  She fit just exactly in his arms, Ellie mused through her dejection. Awareness of what she was doing and where she was suddenly sank in, and she struggled to free herself. Lucky for her, Shane agreeably released her. Had he been so inclined, he could have held her in place with one hand. Probably even one finger.

  Rubbing under her eyes, she sniffled and then grabbed for a handkerchief in her skirt pocket. Shane handed her his instead, and she gratefully wiped her face. Beyond ladylikeness, she blew her nose, too. So far this evening, she’d been faced with an incredibly attractive man, a woman who contended she could make magic, a lion that nearly scared her into wetting her drawers, and a monstrous elephant. She’d be diddly darned if she’d feel embarrassed about blowing her nose in front of that same incredibly attractive man.

  She folded the handkerchief and shoved it in her skirt pocket. “I’ll wash it and return it to you.”

  “Good.”

  Ellie shot him a disgruntled look. “You sound like you thought I’d give it back to you soiled. You shouldn’t have offered it to me, if that was the case. I had my own.”

  “Hey,” Shane said, “I didn’t mean it that way.” He tilted his head and studied her. “I only meant that your returning the handkerchief would give me a chance to see you again.”

  “Oh, sure,” Ellie said without thinking. “I’m standing here all dirty from rolling around in a mud bath an elephant made for me, with my hair all straggly and a red nose and eyes from crying because a lion scared me to death. And you want to—”

  She jerked and her eyes widened. Her mouth dropped open so wide she almost had to push it closed to be able to continue speaking. Her gaze flew up, up, to Shane’s face.

  “You want to see me again?”

  He chuckled. He actually chuckled, and by all rights she should have stalked away from him for daring to laugh at her predicament. But his laughter soothed her, filled her with a sense of self and wonder she’d never experienced before in any man’s presence. Anyone’s presence, for that matter.

  She studied him. He wasn’t in much better shape than she was—muddy trouser knees and shirt, his tawny hair waving loosely around his head, reminding her of the lion’s mane.

  But dishevelment and dirt looked masculine on him, while she must look a complete mess. She came in off a hard day on the range a lot cleaner than this at times.

  “I want to see you again,” he said, heightening her sense of wonder that he could say that in spite of her grubby appearance. “And it’s not your fault at all that your attire and composure got ruined. I’m totally at fault, and I do beg your pardon.”

  “You? My attire and composure? My pardon?” Shoot, she sounded like a mockingbird.

  But there he went again with those words no Texas man even had in his vocabulary, spoken in that harsh, disagreeable-to-her-ears northern accent. Yet somehow the accent wasn’t quite as disagreeable this time; the words more pleasing to her mind. More often than not, she had to lower her own vocabulary level to far below the degree to which she’d educated herself in order to carry on a conversation with a Texas male. Even Rockford, Darlene’s beau, used “ain’t” and dropped his “g’s.”

  “I—” She drew in a breath and reached into her own store of education. “You are extremely kind, sir. But I do realize you are only trying to put me at my ease, so I will not hold you to your only-kind suggestion. I will see that your handkerchief is returned. Good evening.”

  Turning, Ellie headed for the rear of the big top tent instead of the now nonexistent ticket line in front. Just past there, the buggies and wagons were corralled. She knew Rockford’s conveyance, and she’d leave a note for him, telling him to please escort Darlene home himself. That she had a headache and had gone ahead. Darlene wouldn’t mind being lied to one bit, not when it meant she and Rockford could drive back to the ranch unchaperoned.

  “Hey!”

  Ellie ignored Shane and picked up her skirts, hastening her steps. She’d stood in front him quite long enough in her muddy, disheveled state. He might change his mind about seeing her again—if indeed he wasn’t just being polite—if she let him study her too long.

  Elvina told her once that her slight stature could possibly make a man think twice about taking her to wife—especially a Texas man, who needed a strong wife by his side and to bear his children. Of course, with her orphaned background, Ellie could never allow herself to think she might attract a man of another class than the rowdy cowboys she worked with every day. Too, who knew what sort of other secrets her background held.

  Given those long, nicely muscled legs, she should have known she couldn’t outrace Shane Morgan. He stepped in front of her, and short of bouncing off him like an ineffective piece of dandelion fluff, she had no choice but to halt her flight.

  And flight it was, she admitted.

  “Look,” Shane said, jamming his hands into his trouser pockets. “I realize I’m not exactly the escort you would have chosen this evening. You’ve made it quite clear my presence is distasteful to you.”

  “Distasteful?” Ellie gasped. “Why, hardly.”

  “I know you’re just being polite, Miss Parker.”

  “Ellie.”

  He quirked a tawny eyebrow. “I might have your permission to call you Ellie?”

  “Please.” She shoved a tress of hair behind her shoulder. “It makes me uncomfortable to be called Miss Parker.” She’d never tell him why the name bothered her, but then, she’d never have to.

  “Ellie, then. What I’m trying to say is that I can’t bring myself to abandon you until I see you safely home. Maybe in Texas it’s all right for a man to allow a woman he’s been escorting to drive home alone, but in my world it’s just not done.”

  “You haven’t really been my escort, Mr. Morgan—”

  “Shane.”

  “Shane. I can’t ask you to miss the circus, when I’m perfectly capable of getting myself home.”

  “Ellie.” He actually seemed to savor saying her name, and something about the way it rolled off his tongue sent a not-unpleasant trill up her spine. “Truthfully, I’m not a bit interested in that circus. My mother is a delirious fan of the circus, and I’ve been to both Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey in New York City at least twice. Every time it was only because Mother insisted I tag along.”

  Ellie flicked at a piece of drying mud on her forearm, more to have something besides his earnest face and gold-dusted amber eyes to focus on than that it bothered her. Shane picked up on it at once, however.

  “You can’t be comfortable with that mud all over you. I know it’s bothering me, and it’ll just get worse as it dries during your drive home. Why don’t you come back to my suite and clean up before I take you home, Ellie?”

  His audacity earned him an astonished look. Maybe she was a backwoods Texas girl, but she knew better than to visit a man’s hotel suite.

  “I will not, sir!”

  He held out his hands, an injured look on his face.

  “I didn’t mean it that way, Ellie. My valet, Withers, is there. I can assure you, everything is proper, including my intentions. While you’re there, I’ll make myself scarce and arrange to rent a carriage to escort you home in.”

  “I have my own carriage, remember? I’ll leave Rockford a note
, and he can bring Darlene home. Darlene will be ever so grateful to me for the chance to be alone with Rockford, no matter what the circumstances.”

  “Then I’ll need a mount to return to town. I’ll arrange that while you clean up. So, will you allow me to try to make this evening end a little better than it began?”

  He looked so earnest, so boyish, despite his hugeness. And Ellie had to admit, it sort of tickled her fancy to be in control of such a large man—to have him asking her permission rather than just barging ahead and expecting her to follow, as a Texas man would.

  Before she could stop herself, she wondered what it would be like if that control carried over into a more serious situation with a man like him. Or maybe actually with Shane.

  Could she make him groan in frustration because he yearned to kiss her so badly? Or even touch her in other ways?

  Where on earth had those thoughts come from? Ellie shook her head in chastisement, her hair swinging freely with her movements and reminding her of her scandalous appearance.

  “Elvina just might still be awake when I get home,” she mused both to herself and Shane. “So I guess I would appreciate a chance to repair myself before I get there. All my friends are probably at the circus, even their parents, or I could ask one of them to let me clean up at her house. As long as your valet is in attendance, I suppose it will be all right.”

  “Excellent,” Shane said, offering her his arm again. “Your idea was perfect, too. We’ll take your buggy and leave a note on Rockford’s, explaining that we’ve gone on ahead.”

  Ellie slipped her hand into his arm and accompanied him toward the buggy. By now the sun had set, darkness finally making its unrelenting presence known. Overhead pinpoint stars winked into sight, scattering and clustering in the inky sky just beyond grasp in the clear night. Shane ‘s next words indicated the vista charmed him as much as it did her.

  “In New York City,” he murmured, “we seldom see such beauty. There’s still far too many factories on the shoreline.”

  “Do you live in the middle of the city, then?”